18 people suspect: New arrests after tourist murders

Two young tourists have been murdered in Morocco. There are more and more arrests in connection with the case.

AP

Two young tourists did not return from their trip to Morocco. They probably fell into the hands of Islamists and were murdered. The circle of potential perpetrators in connection with the double murder is growing.

Moroccan authorities arrested five other suspects a week after the murder of two Scandinavian women in the Atlas Mountains. The arrests were made in several cities in the kingdom, said Abdelhak Chiam, head of Morocco's central criminal investigation agency BCIJ, the AFP news agency. Thus, in connection with the double murder already 18 people have been arrested.

The two victims had been stabbed, their throats had been cut, said Chiam. Then they were beheaded. The four main suspects in the case had been arrested between Monday and Thursday in Marrakech. The men had sworn allegiance, according to the prosecutor of the jihadist militia Islamic State.

The bodies of 24-year-old Dane and her four-year-old Norwegian girlfriend were found on Monday in a lonely area of ​​the Atlas Mountains. The two had pitched their tent to sleep in a popular hiker area at the foot of Mount Toubkal.

Mourning for the victims

Hundreds of people from the two young women had been thinking in various Moroccan cities on Saturday. In Rabat, the capital of the country, they gathered in front of the embassies of Denmark and Norway to mourn. "Terrorism has neither a religion nor a nationality," read a banner reading.

There had also been a minute's silence in the southern Moroccan town of Imlil, where the two terrorist victims had been discovered. "We condemn this heinous crime and express our deepest condolences to the relatives," it said on one of the banners, as could be seen in pictures of local media. In Marrakech, a few dozen people had gathered to lay flowers and light candles to commemorate the victims of the attacks.